Secretary Rubio Terminates Green Cards of Foreign Nationals Tied to Infamous Iranian Regime Propagandist

This week, three Iranian nationals with ties to the Iranian regime were arrested by federal agents following Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s termination of their lawful permanent resident (LPR) statuses.

Seyed Eissa Hashemi, Maryam Tahmasebi, and their son are now in the custody of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement pending their removal from the United States.

Eissa Hashemi is the son of Masoumeh Ebtekar, also known as “Screaming Mary,” the infamous spokeswoman for the Islamist militants who stormed the U.S. Embassy in Tehran in 1979 and held 52 Americans hostage for 444 days.

Ebtekar was notorious for her role as the leading propagandist for the violent Islamists who perpetrated the Iran hostage crisis. As the lead spokesperson and media intermediary for the hostage-takers, Ebtekar, often referred to in the Western media as “Screaming Mary,” “Sister Mary,” “Tehran Mary,” or simply “Mary,” crafted propaganda falsely showing the humane treatment of the hostages, arranging staged interviews in which the American hostages were pressured to describe their treatment in positive terms – even as they were being held in solitary confinement, blindfolded and starved, and subjected to physical and psychological terror, including beatings and mock executions.

Ebtekar married one of her fellow hostage-takers and went on to rise to senior roles in the highest levels of Iran’s revolutionary regime, serving as a vice president as recently as 2017-2021.  

Hashemi, Tahmasebi, and their son entered the United States in 2014 on visas issued by the Obama Administration. In June 2016 – just months after the IRGC seized two U.S. Navy vessels and captured 10 American sailors – the Obama Administration granted all three Iranian nationals lawful permanent resident (LPR) status via the Diversity Immigrant Visa Program. The issuance of new diversity visas has been suspended by the Trump administration.

Last week, Secretary Rubio terminated the legal status of the niece and grandniece of deceased Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Major General Qasem Soleimani. Hamideh Afshar Soleimani and her daughter are now in the custody of Immigration and Customs Enforcement.

Secretary Rubio also terminated the legal status of Fatemeh Ardeshir-Larijani, daughter of former Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council of Iran Ali Larijani, and her husband Seyed Kalantar Motamedi. Both Ardeshir-Larijani and Motamedi are no longer in the United States and are barred from future entry. 

The U.S. Department of State extends its appreciation to the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement for their continued partnership and collaboration in keeping Americans safe. 

The Trump administration will never allow America to become a home for foreign nationals tied to anti-American terrorist regimes.